Right now it's Thursday night, around 7PM, and I'm dining on a grilled cheese and chicken sandwich (made it myself!) while enjoying a good Belgian Golden ale (yummy) while the Grouchmate is sitting on the couch with Kidgrouch watching "The Freak Show" that I recorded for her Sunday nite, on the VCR.

What is "The Freak Show", you might ask? Haven't you seen the TLC program "17 And Counting", about the Dugger family? Yeah, that's it! Well, I call it "The Freak Show" because that's exactly what it IS! After spending a small part of my youth in a freaky cult group I think that I can creditably judge when something is freaky or not, and the Dugger family qualifies, in MY estimation, as a mini cult.

Why do I think of them that way? Well let me tell you...some time last week, while the Grouchmate was hypnotically watching "17 And Counting", I just happened to catch a portion where a young man asked for permission to "court" one of the Dugger girls. Or maybe it was one of the Dugger BOYS asking to court some other cultish family's daughters...I can't really remember..anyway, when the boy asked for permission the father told the young man "I think you're the one".

I'm sorry, but maybe it was because my personal experience was so similar, but to really think that there is "ONE" person for every person flies in the face of my own experience of "ordained" marriage and eventual divorce that I can't even watch something like that. It all smacked of my own story that it almost gave me the "creeps". No, that's not true... it DID give me the "creeps"!

First of all, to hear kids parrot exactly what they hear from their parents, before they have developed any critical thinking skills, really sets off alarm bells in my mind.

In one respect, I wish that Kidgrouch would emulate her parents in various opinions, but to my horror she is so opposite of her mother and I that I cannot properly comprehend it! So to hear another kid vocalize opinions that mirror his own parents views seems so weird, so alien, that I can only term it as freakish. Hence, "The Freak Show"!

So, what does this have to do with "Beer" in the title? Originally I intended to post about a local liquor outlet that has weekly beer tastings, and how I enjoy trying out different types of beer, but the Duggers just took over my mind (they're playing in the background), so I'll leave the beer tasting for another post...